


Secret Tunnel

by Redrikki



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Badgermoles, Clones, Gen, Women Being Awesome
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-13
Updated: 2016-12-13
Packaged: 2018-09-06 14:35:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,781
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8756401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Redrikki/pseuds/Redrikki
Summary: The path to respect begins with understanding. 
War in the Outer Rim! While fighting on the mining world of Mumblety, Jedi Padawan Ahsoka Tano is tasked with mapping the tunnels along with a team of clones. When trouble strikes, will she have what it takes to save the day and complete the mission?





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Svart_Jade](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Svart_Jade/gifts).



“She’s no Shaak Ti, that’s for sure.” The speaker said it quietly enough that she probably wasn’t supposed to have heard it, but Ahsoka did, loud and clear. She whipped her head around to glare at the approaching clones. What did they know? Ahsoka was just as much a Jedi as Shaak Ti or anyone and worth twice as much in a fight as any clone. Five times, even. If only she could convince her Master to let her prove it.

“Hey!” Anakin shook her shoulder. “Are you even listening to me, Snips?” 

“I heard you.” Ahsoka shrugged his hand off her shoulder. “You’re the one who’s not listening to _me._ How am I supposed to learned to lead if you wont ever let me try?” She’d been his padawan for over a month now and he’d barely let her out of his sight. It was like he didn’t trust her.

Anakin’s shoulders slumped. “Ahsoka, I…” He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “You know what?” He threw up his hands. “Fine. You can join Echo and Fives on their scouting mission.”

The clones exchanged an alarmed look. They probably thought she was just some dumb shiny they’d end up having to rescue. “Sir,” Five said, “I—”

“Scouting?!” Ahsoka cringed at the whine in her own voice. She sounded like an over-tired youngling. They’d never take her seriously now.

Anakin’s face hardened. “Yes, scouting,” he said. “We need intel on those mines if we have any hope of pulling this off.”

Ahsoka’s spine straightened. Her master was finally entrusting her with a vital mission. “My first command!” She fought to keep from beaming but her lips kept curling up. “I won’t let you down, Master.”

Echo and Fives exchanged another one of _those_ looks and Anakin just sighed. “I know you won’t but…Echo is in charge of mapping the tunnels. You and Fives are on security.”

“Sir, yes, sir.” The clones snapped a synchronized salute. “We’ll look after her for you, General,” added Fives.

Ahsoka’s hands curled into fists. He thought he was so tough with his scuffed and painted armor. She’d show him. “I’m the Jedi,” she said, glaring. “ _I’ll_ look after _you_.”

*****

The light from the clones’ headlamps pushed back against the mine’s gloom for a just a few yards before surrendering to the all-consuming darkness. The tunnel was larger than Ahsoka had imagined, wide enough for five people to walk side-by-side and high enough that even her Master couldn’t touch the ceiling standing on tippy-toes. It was strange, the size was too consistent for the tunnel to have been formed by natural processes, but the walls were too rough hewn to have been carved by machines. A cool, moist breeze blew up from the depths like the breath of some giant beast. Ahsoka shivered.

“Shouldn’t you have a light, Commander Tano?” asked Echo.

Igniting her lightsaber would certainly make things easier, but Ahsoka left it on her hip as she strolled past the clones. “I may not be Shaak Ti, but we Togrutas have excellent night vision.”

Fives’ chagrin bled into the Force. “Great hearing too, apparently,” he muttered. 

Ahsoka turned back to look at him, only to be blinded by his headlamp. She shook her head. Was that a joke or an apology or what? He had to know that she’d hear that too. 

Fives wasn’t the only thing she was hearing. The wall on her right was rumbling. She pressed her hand against it and reached out with the Force. The wall wasn’t hollow, exactly, but there was something behind it. A cave, or another tunnel maybe. Whatever was back there, there was something inside it.

“Sir, is everything alright?” Echo asked, broadcasting his confusion and concern into the Force. 

“Can’t you hear that?” Ahsoka knew humans couldn’t hear as well as Togruras, but it was so loud and getting steadily louder. 

Echo took off his helmet and pressed his ear to the wall. “What is that? It sounds like it’s getting closer.”

“Alright, that’s it.” Fives pulled his brother away from the wall. “I don’t know about you two, but I for one have no interest in meeting this world’s version of the Rishi eel.”

Echo’s face paled before disappearing back under his helmet. Both clones backed off and brought their blasters up. “We should go,” Echo said nervously.

Ahsoka just rolled her eyes and pressed her montral against the wall. “Don’t be such cowards. I sense this is very important.” There was definitely something alive on the other side. The rumbling was getting louder, causing the whole tunnel to shake. What ever it was was coming closer and closer and—

Fives tackled her to the floor as the wall exploded outwards with a deafening boom. The clone grunted as falling rocks pummeled his back. An enormous beast burst through the hole and roared in anger as Echo opened fire on it. In the bobbing light of the trooper’s headlamp, Ahsoka got the fleeting impression of giant digging claws, an eyeless face, and bony armor thick enough to block the plasma bursts from Echo’s blaster. 

“Go, go, GO!” Fives hauled Ahsoka up by the scruff of her neck and shoved her further down the tunnel. He moved to join his brother as she stumbled against the far wall. “Come and get it!” he shouted as he fired round after ineffectual round.

“It’s not working! Fall back!” She ignited her lightsaber and charged forward. The beast slammed it’s front claws down with a burst of Force that rocked the whole tunnel. The floor rose up like a wave, knocking all three of them to the ground as the creature rushed towards them. 

“No!” Ahsoka shoved the beast backwards with as much Force as she could muster then yanked down a section of the roof. The creature bellowed as it was buried in falling rocks, but Ahsoka knew her cave-in wouldn’t hold it for long. “Run,” she yelled and led the clones further into the darkness.

*****

Gasping for breath, Fives yanked off his helmet and slumped against the wall of the tunnel. “We can’t keep running.” After two more confrontations and three cave-ins, it felt like they had been running for hours. Even now the sound of the creature digging its way out echoed through the tunnel. It was coming again and running was all that they could do.

Echo leaned over, panting, before collapsing to his knees. Ahsoka envied them. They were all exhausted, but she couldn’t afford to give into it. She was bleeding from a long gash on her left leg, but she forced herself to keep standing. It was what a real leader, a real Jedi, would do. “I know you’re tired, but if we could lure it into an open space, a cave, then I could get the drop on it and—”

“How are we supposed to do that?” Fives demanded, pulling himself up against the wall. “We don’t even know where we are!”

“I dropped the mapping equipment.” Echo shook his head. “We are so lost.”

No. Her first command was not going to end like this. She was not going to let their defeatism bring her down. The Jedi specialized in impossible situations. “Look, I know I’m no _Shaak Ti,_ but I—”

“I’m sorry,” interrupted Fives, his Force presence as sincere as his voice. “I know what it’s like to have to fight to prove yourself and I’m sorry I hurt your feelings earlier, but you need to understand. I don’t respect Shaak Ti because of her skills as a fighter. I respect her because she knows how to put the needs of the unit before her own ego.”

“Oh. I…” behaved like a total brat, Ahsoka realized. Her cheeks burned as she thought about the way she had whined at her master. Would Echo and Fives have even been in this mess if she hadn’t bullied Anakin into letting her come? “I guess I’m sorry too.”

“Great.” Echo pulled himself to his feet. “We’re all sorry. Now how is that going to help us get out of here?”

It wasn’t, but now that they understood each other there was no need to fight. If only do the same with the creature. Ahsoka smacked her forehead. “Ugh, I’m an idiot.” 

The clones exchanged a look. “What?”

“The creature,” she explained. “We need to stop running from it, and go towards it.” 

“Ah, Commander, I’m not so sure that’s a good idea,” said Echo.

Ahsoka raced back up the tunnel towards the sound of the creature digging its way through the last cave-in she’d created to block it. “I’ve been trying to fight it when I should have been trying to communicate with it.” 

The clones jogged to catch up with her. “How are you going to communicate with it?”

“With the Force,” Ahsoka said, reaching out with her hand and her mind. She hesitated. “You, ah, might want to take up shooting positions. Just in case this doesn’t work.”

On the other side of the rock fall, the creature continued digging. She was angry and confused. The shinning being had come to her cave, but it had attacked her when she’d come to offer greetings. They were shinning beings together; how could the other betray her like this?

“I’m sorry,” Ahsoka whispered and offered her remorse to the Force. It was just like with Fives all over again. She hadn’t meant to. She hadn’t understood. They could be friends if they could just forgive each other.

The last of the rocks were swept away and the creature’s snout pushed out of the hole. The clones backed off, blasters raised, but Ahsoka stepped forward. She laid her hand on her new friend’s surprisingly soft nose. 

*****

“I see you made a new friend,” Anakin said as he strolled over to where Ahsoka leaned against the creature’s side. With her help, it had taken them less than an hour to make it back up to the surface. Their new friend’s trick of digging with the Force made their original job of mapping the tunnels pretty much moot, considering she could just change them at a whim. Still, her willingness to work with Ahsoka and the other ‘shining beings’ could make her a valuable ally in the coming battle. Not bad for Ahsoka’s first mission.

“A couple, actually.” Ahsoka nodded to where Echo and Fives were being debriefed by Rex. 

“Well, good.” Anakin offered his hand for the creature to sniff and sent greetings through the Force. “So, did you look after them?” He asked with a sardonic smile. 

Ahsoka smiled back. “I think it’s fair to say that we looked after each other.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to [tonkshamsandwich](http://tonkshamsandwich.tumblr.com/) and [flaminganakin](http://flaminganakin.tumblr.com/) for beta reading.
> 
> Yes, Ahsoka's new friend is basically a space!badgermole. How could I resist?


End file.
